Movie #9 of 2026: Rocky V (1990) This fifth Rocky movie has a reputation as a franchise-killer, performing poorly at the box office compared to its predecessors and likewise receiving worse marks from critics. (It didn’t wind up ending the series entirely, but another 16 years would have to pass before the next installment was …
Author Archives: Joe Kessler
Book Review: UnWorld by Jayson Greene
Book #34 of 2026: UnWorld by Jayson Greene In the not-too-distant future of this novella, people can create digital copies of themselves to serve as a backstop for their fallible physical memories. Generally the uploaded consciousness stays close to the human original, but Ana’s has asked to be set free following the death by apparent …
Book Review: Behooved by M. Stevenson
Book #33 of 2026: Behooved by M. Stevenson The punny premise that lends this romantasy novel its title doesn’t technically spring until almost a quarter of the way through the text, which is late enough that I normally wouldn’t mention it in a review. But since the publisher’s description gives it away anyway, and it …
Book Review: Berserker Base edited by Fred Saberhagen
Book #32 of 2026: Berserker Base edited by Fred Saberhagen (Berserker #7) I’ve never read anything else in Fred Saberhagen’s classic Berserker series (1963-2005), but I know that its core idea of killer self-replicating spaceships programmed by a long-dead race to destroy all life in the universe has been fairly influential in the science-fiction genre. …
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Book Review: The Millicent Quibb School of Etiquette for Young Ladies of Mad Science by Kate McKinnon
Book #31 of 2026: The Millicent Quibb School of Etiquette for Young Ladies of Mad Science by Kate McKinnon (The Millicent Quibb School of Etiquette for Young Ladies of Mad Science #1) This 2024 title unfortunately hasn’t hit the mark for me, much as I love author Kate McKinnon’s work on Saturday Night Live. The …
TV Review: The Lincoln Lawyer, season 4
TV #8 of 2026: The Lincoln Lawyer, season 4 I feel like this show is perpetually on the bubble between three and four stars for me, in that it’s a generally enjoyable legal thriller that isn’t doing anything remotely revolutionary in terms of its cinematography, plot, or so on (beyond I guess staging each season …
Movie Review: Rocky IV (1985)
Movie #8 of 2026: Rocky IV (1985) There’s the seed of a good idea in this movie when Apollo Creed, by now close friends with his former rival Rocky, is killed in the ring while boxing against their latest opponent. (It is, notably, the thread that filmmaker Ryan Coogler would later pick up for his …
Book Review: The Dead Husband Cookbook by Danielle Valentine
Book #30 of 2026: The Dead Husband Cookbook by Danielle Valentine An entertaining blend of Taylor Jenkins Reid with Ruth Ware, in which a down-on-her-luck publishing editor, expecting to soon be fired, is instead tasked with handling the upcoming tell-all memoir from a beloved but secretive celebrity chef. In this novel Maria Capello is a …
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Book Review: Buried Deep and Other Stories by Naomi Novik
Book #29 of 2026: Buried Deep and Other Stories by Naomi Novik A solid mix of 3s and 4s, collecting eleven pieces of short fiction by fantasy author Naomi Novik previously published elsewhere between 2008 and 2019. The remaining two entries that are new to this volume (“After Hours,” which follows her Scholomance trilogy, and …
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Book Review: Fer-de-Lance by Rex Stout
Book #28 of 2026: Fer-de-Lance by Rex Stout (Nero Wolfe #1) This 1934 novel introduces the character of Nero Wolfe, as well as his assistant Archie Goodwin and a few other members of their inner circle. The former is a genius consulting detective in the style of Hercule Poirot (who had debuted in 1920) or …
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